In charting the struggle between academics and religion, authors Bryan Waterman and Brian Kagel have assembled a vast archive of official documents and private interviews covering all sides of the issues. They chronicle day-to-day events—administrative meetings, disciplinary hearings, student rallies, behind-the scenes faculty debates, private conversations, and P.R. posturing—in a provocative history of two decades of turmoil at the nation’s largest religious university.

Bryan Waterman, a Ph.D. candidate in American studies at Boston University, is the former editor of the BYU Student Review, former associate editor of Sunstone, guest editor for a special student issue of Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, editor of The Prophet Puzzle: Interpretive Essays on Joseph Smith, and co-author of The Lord's University: Freedom and Authority at BYU. He lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with his wife and children.

Brian Kagel, a graduate student in journalism at the University of North Texas, is the former editor of BYU's Daily Universe, former managing editor of Sunstone, and co-author of The Lord's University: Freedom and Authority at BYU. He is currently an Online Communications Consultant for Blue Cross Blue Shield and lives with his family in Dallas, Texas.